Review: Marantz PMD620 Handheld WAV Recorder
Pages: 1, 2, 3, 4

Worse, diving into the preset menus is the only way you can make essential recording changes, such as engaging automatic gain control or adding power for an external mic. In practice, that means you will be diving in and altering your presets every time an unanticipated situation comes up. After only a couple of weeks, I found my presets were hopelessly fuddled and I had to return to the factory defaults and start over. I suggest creating two presets for specific recording scenarios and saving the third one for temporary changes.

Incidentally, one preset option selects the input source: internal mic, external mic, line-in, or auto. This last automatically senses if an external mic or line source is connected and even gives priority to the mic in the event you connect two sources. Considering how useful this is I can't see why you would choose the other options.

At 4"x2.5"x1", the PDM620 is one of the smallest WAV recorders on the market. (Click to enlarge.)

On Display

The Display button toggles between different screens depending on the state of the recorder. At rest, you get a screen showing the current record setup (internal/external mic, file format, sample rate, and bit depth), another showing remaining recording time and the number of files, and a third displaying date and time.

The options change when playing back a file. Here you get one screen with the file attributes such as file type, name, and creation date (as with many small digital devices, you can rename a file, but it is a tedious process), a second showing elapsed playing time, and a third with remaining time. Both of the time displays have one of those ubiquitous little scroll bars.

While recording, the choices are a meter screen, one showing elapsed recording time, and another displaying the available recording time.

This is a lot of information, but it is quite well laid out and accessible. Thanks to its OLED (Organic LED), the screen is bright and crisp in a variety of lighting conditions. You can even change the font size on a couple of the screens, a boon to those of us in the gray-hair club.

Interview You

As I mentioned, once you've set up a preset, recording could not be easier. One-button recording is ideal for interviews, so that was the first thing I tried. Unlike some other recorders I have tested, handling and wind noise from moving the recorder between interviewer and interviewee are minimal. I also liked the clear sound of the internal mics on voices:

• Interview, Internal Mics (512KB MP3)

Next I tried an inexpensive lavaliere mic. As this was a mono mic, I appreciated the ability to select both mono input and monaural recording:

• Lavaliere Mic (552KB MP3)

As you can hear, audio quality took a big hit, and there is a fair amount of noise present. Chalk that up more to the mic than the preamp. Later tests showed the preamps, while not pristine, to be within acceptable noise levels for a device in this price range. Of course, if you crank the levels in a quiet room, you'll hear a lot of hiss. Just be sure your dog doesn't bark.

The PMD620 also has a handy feature for those who transcribe interviews or lecture notes: the Skip Back button immediately zips back in time so you can hear a section again. You set the interval — from one to 60 seconds — in the preset menu.